The invention relates to apparatus for supporting rolls of tissue paper or other tearable material and more particularly to such apparatus designed for manual withdrawal and separation of one or more sheets or pieces of desired length from a roll of such tissue.
Many devices have been proposed for the dispensing of sheets from a roll of tissue material. In the case of toilet paper, it has been customary to provide merely a cylindrical supporting roller on which a tissue roll of the type having a cylindrical axial central support opening can be mounted, and from which individual sheets can be torn at perforated lines and removed for use.
Dispensing devices have also been provided for wider rolls of paper material, such as paper towels. Many devices of these types are designed for fixed connection to a wall or other support and cannot readily be moved from place to place, if the particular tissue is needed for some other purpose at a location remote from that at which the roll is ordinarily used.
Portable boxes of individual tissues are also well known, and such tissues may be used as facial tissues or as cleaning tissues for eyeglasses. Boxes of such individual tissues are ordinarily more expensive than standard rolls of tissue, such as even the finer grades of toilet paper or paper towels which have cross perforations to facilitate the separation of individual sheets of predetermined length. The use of such standard rolls for a variety of other uses at different locations, however, is handicapped or discouraged by the lack of well-designed dispensers which are appealing in general appearance and efficient in loading and operation and from which portions of different lengths could easily be torn off without limitation to any fixed spacing between preperforated tear lines of a supply roll.